Description

A party of brave heroes managed to defeat the corrupted guardian Sheltem as he attempted to destroy the world of CRON. However, the great battle between the guardians Corak and Sheltem continued in another place - the world of Terra, where Sheltem was originally appointed as a guardian. Revolting against the powerful race of the Ancients, Sheltem takes possession of their space-traveling nacelles, hurling them at the suns of other planets. It is now up to a group of local adventurers to help Corak and vanquish Sheltem once and for all.

Isles of Terra is the third installment in the Might and Magic series, and a sequel to Gates to Another World. Like its predecessors, it is a role-playing game focusing on first-person exploration of vast pseudo-3D environments, character building, and turn-based combat. The five selectable races remain the same as in the previous games, as well as the eight character classes with the addition of two new ones: Druid and Ranger. Like in the second game, characters may learn unique skills such as thievery, swimming, merchant, and others.

This installment does away with random or pre-set enemy encounters, featuring instead enemies dynamically roaming the game world, allowing to initiate combat from a distance (for example with ranged attacks or spells). There is no option to bribe or surrender to enemies, and escaping combat can be accomplished simply by moving away, unless the enemies have already locked on the party. An automap feature is available at all times, and the player is also allowed to save the game at any time.

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Trivia

Genesis version

A version for the Sega Genesis was in development, but was not released. A ROM image made from a prototype cartridge is available on the internet.

References

In various dungeons in the game you are given Quatloo coins that you can spend in the Slithercult stronghold; quatloos are the coins used for placing bets on Star Trek crew members in the original Star Trek episode "The Gamesters of Triskelon".

One of the monsters is a obese and ugly woman named Scorpia. This is a reference to Scorpia, long-time reviewer for the magazine Computer Gaming World, who wrote a critical review of Might and Magic II: Gates to Another World.

SNES version

There are a number of changes in the SNES version:

The whole intro is missing

All blood during fights was removed and some other screens were changed, e.g. removed bloody weapons in shop screens or the naked statue of the nymph Athea got a bikini.

Some enemies were changed to look more harmless and the Reaper was removed altogether.

There are several text and name changes, e.g. the Cathedral of Carnage became the Cathedral of Darkness and all references to alcohol were removed.